Q Insights #004

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This week’s read time: 7 minutes

Welcome to this edition of Q Insights — our bi-weekly newsletter for sustainability and ESG professionals looking to make smarter solution decisions.

Each edition brings you concise, relevant updates on the tools, trends, and technologies driving the sustainable transition. We filter the noise, highlight what matters, and help you navigate the sustainability solution landscape with clarity and confidence.

In this edition, we’ll cover:

• Q Intelligence: Leading the Trust Race: Sustainability Solutions in Switzerland 📊

• Q Interview: Turning ESG Complexity into Clarity: How Neural Alpha’s Platform Powers Better Decisions (An interview with James Phare, CEO at Neural Alpha)

• Q Signals: Terralytiq, Novisto, and Green Project Technologies announce partnerships and tools to cut emissions and costs and boost reporting, and other news 🟢

• KanataQ Corner: New Listed Providers and Ecosystem Partners announced ✅

• and other insights 💡

Q INTELLIGENCE

New data from KanataQ shows a clear trust gap. Solutions from Switzerland, Canada, and the US are leading on trust -  with average scores of 41%, 39%, and 33% on KanataQ. The global average is just 28%.

Why does it matter? Buyers only engage with solutions they trust. On KanataQ, solutions with a Trust Score of 75% or higher get 7 times more views and 3 times more qualified leads than the rest.

The takeaway? In today’s market, trust is how you stand out. See how to at: kanataq.com/trust_score_summary

Want more insights like this? Join the waitlist for our Market Intelligence Portal by contacting us at [email protected].

Q INTERVIEW

This week’s guest:

James Phare (CEO at Neural Alpha)

For those unfamiliar - how would you describe what Neural Alpha does? Can you walk us through your core offerings and who typically uses your services?

Founded in 2016, Neural Alpha is an award-winning sustainable technology consultancy helping financial institutions, corporates, and NGOs turn sustainability ambitions into actionable, data-driven decisions. We specialize in comprehensive sustainability data solutions covering acquisition, verification, reporting, and strategic analysis.

Our multidisciplinary team brings deep expertise in sustainability frameworks, environmental risk and opportunity analysis, and innovative technology. We've delivered pioneering tools addressing deforestation, biodiversity loss, spatial finance, and maritime decarbonization. We are especially known for integrating complex datasets including supply chains, spatial data, disclosures, and models into unified, context-rich, decision-ready insights.

You’ve also launched your platform, Responsible Capital, which combines AI-powered ESG research with deep contextual data. What kinds of problems is it solving for investors today, and how does it compare to traditional ESG data vendors?

Responsible Capital (RC) is an AI-driven ESG data and analytics platform launched in early 2024, built on years of natural language processing projects. We created RC to address the growing complexity of sustainability disclosures by seamlessly integrating a wide variety of data, including corporate reports, ownership structures, and spatial datasets into decision-ready insights.

Designed for investors and corporates, the platform enables portfolio screening, peer benchmarking, disclosure preparation, and stewardship planning. It draws from over 1 million sustainability and financial disclosures across 6,500 global companies and can analyze any public or private entity. On average, RC reduces the time required for ESG-critical tasks by 50% to 90%.

Today, clients across finance and industry are using RC to streamline ESG workflows, align analysis with internal policies, and meet regulatory demands. Unlike static ESG vendors, RC is fully customizable, context-rich, and interactive. Simply stated, Responsible Capital is game changer for the ESG analytics space.

You’ve been applying AI across your solutions for some time now. How is Neural Alpha leveraging AI to make sustainability data more decision-ready for financial institutions? Any breakthroughs you’re particularly excited about?

Our engineers have been applying AI techniques for decades, especially in areas like spatial impact analysis. Neural networks were so foundational that they partly inspired our company name. In sustainability, where data is largely unstructured, Large Language Models have unlocked powerful automation potential. However, their value depends on strong data governance and architecture.

Many companies now offer ChatGPT-style tools for ESG, but these often produce vague or inaccurate results. General-purpose language models are trained on broad internet content rather than domain-specific data, which leads to unreliable assessments—a critical issue in regulated industries.

RC takes a different approach. Built through extensive prototyping with early adopters, it combines structured sustainability and financial data with more than one million disclosures. Our ESG knowledge is semantically encoded to deliver more accurate and relevant results than standard models.

At the core of the platform is a proprietary sustainability Knowledge Graph powered by Retrieval Augmented Generation, ensuring insights are always contextual and traceable. With enterprise-grade security, full identifier coverage, and seamless integration into existing workflows, Responsible Capital is built for real-world ESG use. An upcoming release will also include a major advance in sustainability indicator extraction. Stay tuned!

The ESG data space is crowded, but the demand for better, more decision-ready tools is only growing. How do you balance innovation with practicality when developing tools that need to integrate into complex financial and ESG workflows?

Yes! the ESG data space is crowded! And with nearly everyone claiming to use AI, the real challenge is distinguishing substance from hype. We’re now in a post-hype phase where market consolidation is inevitable, and the focus is shifting to practical, integrated solutions.

While tools like ChatGPT have generated excitement, many sustainability professionals are running into limitations. Not every ESG task fits into a chat interface. Real impact comes from tools that work with existing systems such as Excel and deliver clear, immediate value.

At Neural Alpha, we prioritise usability and relevance. Our approach filters down to the few data points that truly matter and breaks ESG analysis into actionable, manageable steps. For our users, what once took days can now be done in hours.

We also know that AI is not a silver bullet. Success requires support. That’s why we work closely with users, offering training and expert guidance. We see AI as part of the toolkit—amplifying, not replacing, structured data and human judgment.

Responsible Capital is built around that philosophy. It evolves continuously based on user feedback and is grounded in the realities of how ESG work actually gets done.

Q SIGNALS

Latest developments, insights, and trends

📊 New tools, features, and funding rounds from solution providers

Terralytiq (KanataQ listed) and Bain & Company launched a global strategic partnership to help companies reduce supply chain emissions and costs. Terralytiq’s AI-driven platform automates Scope 3 data collection, offers supplier-specific emissions insights, and supports sustainable procurement decisions. The partnership will combine Bain’s strategic insights and benchmarks with Terralytiq’s technology to provide clients with detailed carbon footprinting and automated supplier engagement. Currently supporting clients in sectors like energy, manufacturing, and finance, the collaboration aims to expand across more industries and help cut up to one billion tons of industrial emissions by 2030. (link)

Novisto (KanataQ listed) and Broadridge Financial Solutions announced a new partnership to deliver a comprehensive suite of sustainability data management and reporting tools to help companies meet rising regulatory and investor demands. The collaboration will provide end-to-end solutions—from data collection and peer benchmarking to auditing and disclosure—aimed at simplifying and standardizing sustainability reporting. The partnership follows Novisto’s recent $27 million funding round and leverages Broadridge’s corporate issuer expertise with Novisto’s technology to support high-quality, investor-ready ESG disclosures. (link)

Green Project Technologies (KanataQ listed) launched act50, a digital renewable energy marketplace designed to help companies reduce and track Scope 3 supply chain emissions. The platform enables suppliers of any size to procure traceable clean energy through renewable energy certificates (EACs) and automates transactions using ACT Group’s CerQlar registry infrastructure to ensure auditability and credibility. The launch supports companies’ Scope 3 emissions strategies with the same level of trust typically applied to Scope 1 and 2 efforts. (link)

Nasdaq launched the Nasdaq Carbon Academy, a free educational platform designed to help individuals and companies integrate carbon dioxide removal (CDR) credits into emissions reduction strategies. Developed in collaboration with AirMiners, the academy addresses growing demand for carbon offset knowledge by offering self-paced courses, expert insights, and real-world case studies. It covers topics from CDR fundamentals and methodologies to budgeting, MRV, and quality assessment, making it suitable for business leaders, environmental professionals, and investors.

Achilles launched Comply360, a new enterprise platform designed to streamline and automate sustainability and non-financial reporting amid increasing ESG data demands and regulatory complexity. The platform uses AI to extract data from company documents for structured disclosures, includes a carbon estimator aligned with global standards, and integrates with ERP systems and third-party tools. Supporting frameworks like CSRD, IFRS, and GRI, Comply360 aims to simplify ESG reporting with efficiency and accuracy, reducing the internal resource burden for organizations.

KANATAQ CORNER

What’s new on KanataQ?

📈 KanataQ Growing Family

Here is the list of providers that joined KanataQ since our last edition: Telusio (Climate Action), Prime Directive Analytics (Governance & Accountability), Green Digest (Sustainability Communication), Gestion Social (Strategic Advisory Services), Walk The Talk Consultancy (Strategic Advisory Services), Sustainable Market Strategies (Strategic Advisory Services), Pacific Risk Advisors (Strategic Advisory Services), TrackZero (Climate Action) and kShuttle (Sustainable Operations).

🔵 New Ecosystem Partners

We’re pleased to welcome Jonathan Elkin, who joins KanataQ as an associate partner. As a reminder KanataQ Ecosystem Partners are a select group of sustainability experts carefully chosen by KanataQ to contribute to the platform's growth and success.

Come join us

Are you a sustainability solution provider? Join KanataQ, the platform where sustainability solution providers connect with high-intent buyers. Generate quality leads, gain market insights, and maximize ROI with our commission-free model. List with us today.

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